uhhhhh.......wow he needs to get a girlfriend or a life or maby both

@ Soul

[i]The pool is closed[/i] - fixed.

[...] Via | GamePolitics [...]

First time I saw Habbo hotel in the news. hmm, I doubt one can devide enough to find how little I care.

Plenty of crime left in Amsterdam, but I don't really see a problem with taking legal measures against the theft of property that was paid for with real money. It's not always easy to do, but if it's a clearcut case where you can tell who did the hacking? Why let 'em run free because it happened to be in a virtual environment? One way or another it's $1400.

It seems like something the admins could have done themselves, without police involved but...

This might lead to punishments for in-game theft of items. While that seems a bit silly, considering time put in to get those things, or pay for them only to have it taken, I figure something should happen besides a slap on the wrist.

Though as long as this doesn't lead to cops busting down 13 year olds' doors because they rolled 'Need' on that Epic, I'm sure it won't get out of hand.

Well if you steal 1400$ in real life, just giving it back won't cut it. But imo it would be enough if they returned the items and got their IP's banned.

That's just a waste of law enforcement. While they're dealing with online people who steal furniture, there are real criminals out there who are robbing banks, drug dealing, murderers, rapists, etc. Go after them.

Well, at least these guys are getting what they deserve for what they did, rather than what happened FROM what they did.

This isn't the first time that Habbo Hotel makes it in the news, you obviously don't watch Fox News enough.

I think that d.evl.oper's approach is the one to take.

And, quite frankly, account pishing is very common indeed, so why do people still fall for it? Hacking for $5800 furniture ain't gonna cut it, especially if you /are/ going to get caught like that.

Most of the Habbo population are young adults looking for sex anyway, they shouldn't fall for this. And if they do, then they deserve it.

P.S. : Who do actually buy furniture in Habbo Hotel or thing like that? The Sims are there for you man.

That's what they get from stealing and closing the pool acting like racists.

I think these guys need to be prosecuted. Probably not as thiefs in the general sense, but more as identity thieves. Phishing, social engineering. These things are against the law. So they do need to be prosecuted.

buying virtual furnature for habbo hotel? sounds like these people are getting ripped off already.

@ GP
Have you tried putting yourself into their shoes? Seriously, how would you feel if someone stole from you something you paid for? It doesn't matter if it is virtual or not, the "victims" paid for the stuff.

GP: I'm not condoning the theft. I am suggesting it's a ridiculous waste of police resources and could easily be handled by the Habbo operator...

I don't fully understand how any virtual item in any online game could be legally valued at $1,400. I definitely do not understand how virtual furniture could be valued so highly.

However, I found GP's aside on the story to be dangerously flippant. It seems to assume that virtual property can have so little real world value that stealing it cannot be a "real crime."

In some cases, we all agree that virtual property -- those "1s and 0s" -- do indeed have real world value. When a person goes to Best Buy and spends $60 on an Xbox 360 game, he isn't really buying a plastic disc in a case. He is buying the right to use the game code stored on the plastic disc -- those 1s and 0s. Pretty much every EULA ever confirms this point of view, even if it's not exactly the way we think about buying games when we go to the store.

If the 1s and 0s on the plastic disc can have real-word value, why not the 1's and 0s on a social networking server? Again, I am not sure why anyone would pay $1,400 for a virtual couch, but if he did, why shouldn't his property rights be legally protected like any one else's?

Certainly, there is a lot left for society to figure out about virtual property ownership in regard to traditional property law, but one of the ways these things get figured out is through test cases like this one.

If GP wants to argue that virtual property in Habbo has no real-world value, or that it can't legally be owned by players, that's fine -- that would add to the discussion and raise new considerations. But the unbridled relativism of dismissing the entire case as 'too minor a crime for police to investigate' is unfair. Should police ignore that fact I steal bikes just because other people are stealing cars?

@illspirit
I don't see how your random call for anarchy applies in this case. When it comes to enforcing laws established by the government, are you saying the government SHOULDN'T have a legal monopoly on force?

Are you suggesting that we all should correct any perceived wrongs individually, without consideration to the precedents and procedures our societies have established through legislation? If everyone has to carry around his own hammer all the time, everything ends up looking like a nail to someone.

Frankly, I don't really care who wields the hammer, so long as I have my due share of 'architectural input.' Those who take part in drafting the blueprints get to help decide where the nails go and where they don't.

While electronic "property" is difficult to legislate, criminally or otherwise, the fact it, it has been.

"copy"... "paste"... duplicated.

The argument is that the items were purchased for roughly $1400 US REAL currency.

The fact is, that movies, music, TV shows, books, etc, that are digitized and transmitted over the Internet amount to "copy", "paste", duplicated, as well.

Someone created those electronic items on Habbo Hotel and sold them. Some music, even games, are created and distributed (by online retailers) online as well and only exist in electronic format.

Is there really ANYTHING that would be considered "too small" for IP protection?

Nightwng2000
NW2K Software

I sorta have to agree with the masses here, Dennis. It's not really what was actually DONE here more than the process he used to DO it. The potential damaga was a lot worse than what it turned out to be, and they stopped the suspect's actions before anything serious would come of it.

The fact that the admins can return the stolen property does not make the fact that they stole the stuff okay. It's over a thousand dollars poured into this property. For it to be taken away and then the offender to just be told they can't play a videogame anymore is... really a pathetic punishment.
It doesn't matter what the means of doing so is. If you take $1.5k you deserve to actually be punished.

GP: I don't disagree that those involved need to be dealt with. I do view bringing the police into this as a complete waste of time.

I think the real issue here is that they are trying to set some precedent, without much on the line. If successful, law enforcement in other countries would have an easier time doing the same.

NO U!

I don't really see a problem with it.

Just like if i scammed someone's credit card info for my personal gain, I've scammed someone's login info to steal things that cost actual money/have real world worth. Sure, the admins could reverse it (as far as I know), but it could still be deemed theft, IMHO

There is a difference between 'stealing' items in a virtual world (for example, copying an item in Second Life, or even stealing gold off someone in World of Warcraft) and phishing accounts, which is essentially fraud.

I agree if they've got a ton of officers wrapped up in an investigation, it might be a bit inefficient usage of man-power...
But fraud is fraud. You steal that much from someone, regardless of the form its in; it has the currency value, and therefore should be taken as a real crime.
And it really shouldn't take _that_ much man-power-time to get the kids who did it..

So if these people need to be dealt with in a legal fashion, and it wasn't appropriate to call in the police on the matter, who the hell is GP suggesting they should have turned to? The A-Team?!

@illspirit

Even the staunchest libertarians I know would admit that the state is required to adjudicate and enforce contract law. Regardless, from the scant information available, it still appears to me this may be a criminal case, as it seems to involve the theft of personal property.

Unless you are claiming there should be no punitive component to criminal sentencing, I still don't quite understand what these PoliSci 101 lectures are supposed to tell me about virtual property ownership.

In any case, thanks for the response!

But the admids at habbo hotel are racists. If it wasn't for their anti-lulz, POOL'S CLOSED wouldn't be here.

good for the people who be selfish with their furni

I AM SO THANKFUL FOR THE POLICE FORCE because i was one of the people that got scammed i admit i was v. stupid for putting my pword in there but i have definatly lernt my lesson there but the police, CONGRATS TO U!

Bean Bag Covers...

I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you....